1. The Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to methods and systems for configuring a communication system. More particularly, the present invention relates to methods and systems for configuring a communication system to access a telephone network according to the electrical requirements imposed by the telephone network.
2. Present State of the Art
Communication systems, such as modems, that connect to public telephone networks are required to meet certain access requirements defined by the telephone network. These access requirements include provisions for physically protecting the telephone network""s equipment as well as provisions defining how the communication system must interact with the telephone network. For example, one standard requires electrical isolation between modems or other communication systems and the telephone network. These isolation requirements are formulated by agencies such as the Federal Communications Commission in the United States and corresponding regulatory agencies in other countries to prevent accidental injection of potentially harmful or extraneous signals through the telephone network.
Although specific regulations and access requirements may vary from one country to another, certain electrical circuits have established themselves as useful in meeting the requirements of most regulatory agencies. A data access arrangement (DAA) is one circuit that has proved beneficial in meeting various electrical isolation requirements. Communication systems in general, and modems in particular, may need to interact with multiple telephone networks having distinct access requirements. Furthermore, manufacturers of communication systems may prefer to manufacture a single product capable of interacting with many telephone networks, the single product being configured to operate with a specific telephone network at the time of installation.
An environment where a communication system is connected to a public telephone network may include a modem operably coupled to a host that connects to a public telephone network. To meet the access requirements of a public telephone network, the modem may employ a DAA, the DAA providing electrical isolation between the public telephone network and communication system. Where a modem is designed to function in multiple countries, the DAA must be capable of being configured to meet the varying requirements imposed by individual public telephone networks.
A modem may be designed to work in multiple countries for one of several reasons. For example, the modem may be designed for use with a laptop computer that may need to access public telephone networks worldwide. Alternatively, it may be economically unwise to manufacture custom modems for each unique telephone network because this would require distributors to maintain an inventory of each type. Therefore, a single, configurable modem that is capable of functioning with more than one telephone network may be more attractive. In either case, those skilled in the art have recognized a need to provide communication systems than can be configured to operate in any part of the world.
To meet this need, international modems have been developed that are designed for use in many countries worldwide. Many of these modems have been specifically designed to alternate between configurations depending on the location of the modem. For example, where a laptop computer user travels between multiple countries/locations, the modem will need to be configured for each destination to insure proper operation. Similarly, modems designed for operation in any one of several countries/locations, while not necessarily required to change from one configuration to another, nevertheless must be configured initially.
However, traditional methods and systems for configuring modems have suffered from several shortcomings. Specifically, constant political change has made it difficult to offer an accurate selection of countries/locations, especially where the country/location selections are stored in the modem""s firmware. Therefore, traditional modem configuration methods and systems have offered a limited number of country/location choices. Furthermore, traditional methods and systems for configuring modems have provided limited capabilities for updating the list of supported countries/locations. Again, where the selections are stored in a modem""s firmware, updating the list is a significant task requiring physical handling of the modem.
Due to the foregoing difficulties, some traditional modem configuration systems and methods group together countries with similar access requirements. While this approach allows for the appearance of supporting many countries/locations, it is not an ideal solution. For example, the groupings may not list each and every country/location, requiring the user to know which countries/locations have similar access requirements. Furthermore, the grouping approach may present users with an extensive list of countries/locations to chose from and then map the users"" selection to another country/location with similar access requirements. This approach works well for the initial configuration because the user is presented with unambiguous choices from which to select. However, subsequent diagnostics or configuration will lead to confusion because when the modem is queried for its current configuration, it will report the mapped selection rather than the users actual selection, leaving some question in the user""s mind if the modem is correctly configured.
The problems in the prior state of the art have been successfully overcome by the present invention which is directed to methods and systems for configuring a communication system to meet the access requirements of a public telephone network. The present invention provides methods and systems for configuring a communication system that may be updated without physically handling the communication system to be configured. Furthermore, these methods and systems present a list of configuration options representing virtually every country/location, in the world. Moreover, the methods and systems of the present invention, also alleviate the problems associated with grouping multiple countries/locations into a single configuration option.
More specifically, in a preferred embodiment of the present invention, a personal computer containing a modem that needs to access a public telephone network executes computer code to configure the modem. The computer code identifies the currently selected or default country/location, identifies the modem to be configured if it can be accessed, and presents the user with a list of countries/locations from which to make a selection. The country/location flag is included with country/location name to aid a user in making the correct selection. The user may limit the number of countries/locations that are displayed by selecting a geographic region. Furthermore, the user can optionally select from advanced options that allows for importing additional countries/locations. This feature is useful when the names of countries/locations change or when the access requirements of a particular country/location need to be updated.
It is, therefore, an object of the present invention to provide methods and systems for configuring a communication system to meet the access requirements of a public telephone network.
It is a further object of the invention to allow a user to chose from virtually every identified country/location in the world during the configuration.
It is yet another object of the invention to provide methods and systems for adding or updating the country/location selections available.
It is also an object of the invention to track the actual country/location selected where the communication system groups several countries/locations together in a single configuration choice.
Additional objects and advantages of the invention will be set forth in the description which follows, and in part will be obvious from the description, or may be learned by practicing the invention. The objects and advantages of the invention may be realized and obtained by means of the instruments and combinations particularly pointed out in the appended claims. These and other objects and features of the present invention will become more fully apparent from the following description and appended claims, or may be learned by the practice of the invention as set forth hereinafter.